At any vaguely-related conferences, teams of hackers generally come collectively to create an influence, and generally that influence is swinging one thing into an airspace of a neighboring nation. [deadprogram] tells us that such a factor occurred at FOSDEM, the place a small group of hackers got here collectively (Nitter) to assemble, program and launch a pico balloon they named TinyGlobo 1, which then flew all the best way to France!

This balloon is constructed round a RP2040, and the firmware is written in TinyGo, a model of Go language for microcontroller use. As is becoming for a hacker group, each the {hardware} and {hardware} are open supply. Don’t anticipate customized PCBs although, because it’s a completely protoboarded construct. However just a few off-the-shelf modules will get you a similar {hardware} that simply flew a 400km route! For construct experiences, there’s additionally just a few tweets from the folks concerned, and a launch video, additionally embedded under.

This reminds us of the Supercon 2022 balloon story — darn copycats! In case you’re within the extra Earthly particulars of this yr’s FOSDEM open supply growth convention, take a look at our latest protection.